Hugh Grant

Hugh Grant, Actor Hugh Grant told a London courtroom on Monday about the dark side of celebrity life, describing mysterious break-ins, leaked medical details and hacked voice mails – and laying blame on the entire tabloid press, not just the now-shuttered News of the World.

Grant’s testimony to a judge-led media ethics inquiry capped a tough day for Britain’s beleaguered press. Earlier, the parents of a murdered schoolgirl whose phone was targeted by the tabloid described how the hacking had given them false hope that their daughter was still alive.

Grant said he believes his phone was hacked by Britain’s Mail on Sunday tabloid – the first time he has implicated a newspaper not owned by media mogul Rupert Murdoch in the wrongdoing.

The actor said a 2007 story about his romantic life in the paper, owned by Murdoch rival Associated Newspapers Ltd., could only have been obtained through eavesdropping on his voice mails.

He said he could not think of any other way the newspaper could have obtained the story alleging that his romance with Jemima Khan was on the rocks because of his conversations with a “plummy voiced” woman the paper identified as a film studio executive.

Grant said there was no such woman, but he did receive voice messages from the assistant of a movie producer friend.

“She would leave charming, joking messages … and she had a voice that can only be described as plummy,” he said.

Grant sued the newspaper for libel and won.

Challenged about whether he had hard evidence, Grant acknowledged he was speculating.

“But … I’d love to hear what the Daily Mail or the Sunday Mail’s explanation of what that source was if it wasn’t phone hacking,” he said.